Author: James D Tabor
Series: none
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Published Date: April 24, 2007
ISBN: 9780743287241
Buy It Links: Amazon | Barnes and Noble
Rating: 4 1/2 stars
Synopsis: The Jesus Dynasty offers a startling new interpretation of the life of Jesus and the origins of Christianity that is grounded in careful analysis of the earliest Christian documents and recent archaeological discoveries, including the much-discussed "Jesus family tomb."
In The Jesus Dynasty, biblical scholar James Tabor brings us closer than ever to the historical Jesus. He explains the crucial relationship between Jesus, a royal descendant of David, and his relative John the Baptizer, a priestly descendant of Aaron and Jesus' teacher. When John was killed, several of his followers -- including Jesus' four brothers -- joined with Jesus, who continued John's mission, preaching the same apocalyptic message. After Jesus confronted the Roman authorities in Jerusalem and was crucified, his brother James succeeded him as the leader of the Jesus dynasty.
James Tabor has studied the earliest surviving documents of Christianity for more than thirty years and has participated in important archaeological excavations in Israel. His reconstruction of the life of Jesus and his followers, and of the early years of Christianity, will change our understanding of one of the most crucial moments in history.
Review: I borrowed a copy of this book out from my local library.
This book was so cool to read. I loved how the author used more sources than just the Gospels, outside sources, and explained things in a cultural perspective. This year I have tried and tried to sit down and read the Bible, even a little a day and get through the whole thing. In January I did really well. As the days progressed though, it became harder and harder for me to fit it into my schedule, and the readings seemed to get longer and longer. However, the little that I did read either brought up more questions, or some suspicion. After all, did Noah really live to 900ish years?
Getting back to the point, the author of this book made it very believable in his hypotheses, even using statistics to lend a very credible air to his argument that the probability of the "Jesus tomb" being the tomb of the one in the Bible was pretty darn convincing. The way that he explained the way Jesus probably thought culturally, was inspiring.
The only thing I didn't like was towards the end, the author seemed to be very anti-Paul. However, maybe it should be, maybe the real Jesus would have been.
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